Oppn not dog-whistling on refugees: Abbott

Date: February 28 2013

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has rejected Labor claims the coalition is dog whistling on immigration by calling for behaviour protocols on asylum seekers in community detention.

Opposition immgration spokesman Scott Morrison said on Wednesday that local residents should be notified when asylum seekers were housed in their area, and called for new behaviour protocols for asylum seekers housed in the community.

He was commenting after an asylum seeker was charged with indecent assault of a student in her dormitory at Macquarie University in Sydney.

Cabinet minister Peter Garrett describes the call as "a major dog whistle" which has been exposed by one of the coalition's own MPs.

But Mr Abbott rejects any suggestion the coalition is trying to stir up community concerns.

"If anyone is guilty of that, I would ask you to look at what the government has had to say recently about section 457 visas," he told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.

Senior Liberal MP Eric Abetz said the plan would help build a cohesive society.

"I would have thought that it would be a good idea to say that somebody's moving next door to you, that might not be able to have all the English language skills you might have normally have expected or they come from a traumatised background," he said.

Labor Senator Doug Cameron was unimpressed.

"The dog whistle you have just seen is the worst politics I have witnessed for many years in this parliament," he said, adding there was no evidence refugees or asylum seekers in Australia were criminals.

The Australian Greens say existing laws are the appropriate behaviour protocols.